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Happy New Year: Introducing Incredible PBX 2027



If we have one complaint with open source VoIP telephony, it would be this. Commercial PBXs used to last for a decade or more. Now, most open source VoIP platforms are measured in months. So, we have a better idea. We’re going to tell you up front how long Incredible PBX 2027 with Rocky 8 and Asterisk® 20 and FreePBX® 16 is going to be supported. And, for procrastinators, you’ll have until the fall of that year to line up an alternative. Having said all of that, we are pleased to introduce Incredible PBX 2027-R for Rocky 8 and AlmaLinux 8 featuring Asterisk 20 and your choice of FreePBX 15 or 16.

UPDATE: Proxmox image of Incredible PBX 2027-R now available in the Incredible PBX Repository.

CAUTION: Because of frequent changes in Rocky 8 that regularly "break things," we no longer recommend it for production use with Incredible PBX>

Begin by downloading and installing Rocky 8 Minimal. If you prefer AlmaLinux, download and install their minimal image from here. If you prefer a cloud-based platform, consider CrownCloud for $25/year or our Platinum sponsor, Vultr. Both providers host Rocky 8 and AlmaLinux 8 AMD64 images in addition to other operating systems so platform setup is quick.

Once you have your platform up and running, login as root and issue the following commands to kick off the Incredible PBX 2022 install:

cd /root
yum -y install wget tar
wget http://incrediblepbx.com/incrediblepbx2027.tar.gz
tar zxvf incrediblepbx2027.tar.gz
rm -f incrediblepbx2027.tar.gz
./IncrediblePBX2027.sh

Once the Phase I install finishes, your server will reboot. Log back in as root and run the installer a second time:

cd /root
./IncrediblePBX2027.sh

When the install finishes, reboot your server and login again as root. Incredible PBX will run the Automatic Update Utility to bring your server up to current specs.

If you chose to install AlmaLinux 8, issue the following command while still logged into the Linux CLI as root:

sed -i 's|Rocky 8|AlmaLinux 8|' /usr/local/sbin/pbxstatus

Just a few more preliminary steps, and you’ll be ready to go:

1. Create a secure root password for your server by issuing the command: passwd

2. Remove temporary user account: userdel -r temp-user-name

3. Set up an admin password for browser access to the FreePBX GUI: /root/admin-pw-change

4. Set up an admin password for Apache access to AsteriDex and Reminders: /root/apache-pw-change

5. Set the correct time zone for your server: /root/timezone-setup

6. If free -h shows no swapfile enabled, issue this command: /root/create-swapfile-DO

As with all Incredible PBX builds, a preconfigured Linux firewall is included which blocks all access except from whitelisted IP addresses. You can whitelist additional IP addresses using the /root/add-ip script or /root/add-fqdn.

You’re now ready to explore the Incredible PBX feature set using the tutorials available on the Incredible PBX Wiki.

Configuring Gmail Smarthost for Incredible PBX 2027

One piece you’ll need for many tasks in Incredible PBX 2027-R is a way to send emails from your server. The easiest method to accomplish this is to configure SendMail to use a Gmail SmartHost. We’ve included a script in the /root folder to make it painless. Simply run: /root/enable-gmail-smarthost-for-sendmail. When prompted, enter your Gmail account name (without @gmail.com) and then enter a Gmail Application Password, not your standard Gmail password. If you don’t have one, you can obtain one here. Once you’ve configured SendMail, try things out by sending an email to any valid email address:

echo "test" | mail -s testmessage someone@somewhere.vom

Upgrading to FreePBX 16 with Incredible PBX 2027-R

By default, Incredible PBX 2027-R comes preconfigured with the tried-and-true FreePBX 15 GUI. But there’s a new kid on the block, FreePBX 16. If you’d like to take it for a spin, the upgrade is painless. Simply issue the following command while logged into your server as root: /root/upgrade-to-FreePBX16.


Audio Issues with Incredible PBX 2027-R

If you experience one-way or no audio on some calls, add your external IP address and LAN subnet in the GUI by navigating to Settings -> Asterisk SIP Settings. In the NAT Settings section, click Detect Network Settings. Click Submit and Apply Settings to save your changes. While you’re there, click on the chan/pjsip tab and set Allow Transports Reload to NO.

Choosing SIP Providers for Incredible PBX 2027-R

Incredible PBX 2027-R comes preconfigured with support for five SIP extensions and a dozen major SIP providers including Skyetel, VoIP.ms, V1VoIP, and Anveo Direct. We hope you’ll choose Skyetel not only because they financially support Nerd Vittles and our open source projects, but also because it is a clearly superior platform offering crystal-clear communications and triple-redundancy so you never miss a call. Skyetel also sets itself apart from the other providers in the support department. They actually respond to issues, and there’s never a charge. As the old saying goes, they may not be the cheapest, but you get what you pay for. Even without taking advantage of Nerd Vittles half-price offer on up to $500 of Skyetel services, they’re still dirt cheap compared to the Bell Sisters and cable companies. Skyetel is so sure you’ll love their service that they give you a $10 credit to kick the tires before you ever spend a dime. Traditional DIDs are $1 per month. Outbound conversational calls are $0.012 per minute. Incoming conversational calls are a penny a minute, and CallerID lookups are $0.004. You only pay for minutes you use. Once you’re satisfied with the service and fund your account, you can port in your existing DIDs at no cost for 60 days after signup. In short, you have nothing to lose by trying out the Skyetel service.

Configuring Skyetel for Incredible PBX 2027-R

If you’ve decided to go with Skyetel, here’s the drill. Sign up for Skyetel service and take advantage of the Nerd Vittles specials. First, complete the Prequalification Form here. You then will be provided a link to the Skyetel site to complete your registration. Once you have registered on the Skyetel site and your account has been activated, open a support ticket and request the $10 credit for your account by referencing the Nerd Vittles special offer. Once you are satisfied with the service, fund your account as desired, and Skyetel will match your deposit of up to $250 simply by opening another ticket. That gets you up to $500 of half-price calling. Credit is limited to one per person/company/address/location. Effective 10/1/2023, $25/month minimum spend required.

Skyetel typically does not use SIP registrations to make connections to your PBX. Instead, Skyetel utilizes Endpoint Groups to identify which servers can communicate with the Skyetel service. An Endpoint Group consists of a Name, an IP address, a UDP or TCP port for the connection, and a numerical Priority for the group. For incoming calls destined to your PBX, DIDs are associated with an Endpoint Group to route the calls to your PBX. For outgoing calls from your PBX, a matching Endpoint Group is required to authorize outbound calls through the Skyetel network. Thus, the first step in configuring the Skyetel side for use with your PBX is to set up an Endpoint Group. Here’s a typical setup for Incredible PBX 2020:

  • Name: MyPBX
  • Priority: 1
  • IP Address: PBX-Public-IP-Address
  • Port: 5060
  • Protocol: UDP
  • Description: my.incrediblepbx.com

To receive incoming PSTN calls, you’ll need at least one DID. On the Skyetel site, you acquire DIDs under the Phone Numbers tab. You have the option of Porting in Existing Numbers (free for the first 60 days after you sign up for service) or purchasing new ones under the Buy Phone Numbers menu option.

Once you have acquired one or more DIDs, navigate to the Local Numbers or Toll Free Numbers tab and specify the desired SIP Format and Endpoint Group for each DID. Add SMS/MMS and E911 support, if desired. Call Forwarding and Failover are also supported. That completes the VoIP setup on the Skyetel side. System Status is always available here.

Configuring VoIP.ms for Incredible PBX 2027-R

To sign up for VoIP.ms service, may we suggest you use our signup link so that Nerd Vittles gets a referral credit for your signup. Once your account is set up, you’ll need to set up a SIP SubAccount and, for Authentication Type, choose Static IP Authentication and enter your Incredible PBX 2027-R server’s public IP address. For Transport, choose UDP. For Device Type, choose Asterisk, IP PBX, Gateway or VoIP Switch. Order a DID in their web panel, and then point the DID to the SubAccount you just created. Be sure to specify atlanta1.voip.ms as the POP from which to receive incoming calls. In the Incredible PBX GUI, be sure to enable the VoIP.ms trunk.

Configuring V1VoIP for Incredible PBX 2027-R

To sign up for V1VoIP service, sign up on their web site. Then login to your account and order a DID under the DIDs tab. Once the DID has been assigned, choose View DIDs and click on the Forwarding button beside your DID. For Option #1, choose Forward to IP Address/PBX. For the Forwarding Address, enter the public IP address of your server. For the T/O (timeout) value, set it to 2o seconds. Then click the Update button. Under the Termination tab, create a new Endpoint with the public IP address of your server so that you can place outbound calls through V1VoIP. In the Incredible PBX GUI, be sure to enable all of the V1VoIP trunks.

Configuring Anveo Direct for Incredible PBX 2027-R

To sign up for Anveo Direct service, sign up on their web site and then login. After adding funds to your account, purchase a DID under Inbound Service -> Order DID. Next, choose Configure Destination SIP Trunk. Give the Trunk a name. For the Primary SIP URI, enter $[E164]$@server-IP-address. For Call Options, select your new DID from the list. You also must whitelist your public IP address under Outbound Service -> Configure. Create a new Call Termination Trunk and name it to match your server. For Dialing Prefix, choose six alphanumeric characters beginning with a zero. In Authorized IP Addresses, enter the public IP address of your server. Set an appropriate rate cap. We like $0.01 per minute to be safe. Set a concurrent calls limit. We like 2. For the Call Routing Method, choose Least Cost unless you’re feeling extravagant. For Routes/Carriers, choose Standard Routes. Write down your Dialing Prefix and then click the Save button.

Before you can make outbound calls through Anveo Direct from your PBX, you first must configure the Dialing Prefix that you wrote down in the previous step. Log into the GUI as admin using a web browser and edit the Anveo-Out trunk in Connectivity -> Trunks. Enable the Trunk. Then click on the custom-Settings tab and replace anveo-pin with your actual Dialing Prefix. Click Submit and Apply Config to complete the setup. In the Incredible PBX GUI, be sure to enable all of the remaining Anveo trunks.

By default, incoming Anveo Direct calls will be processed by the Default inbound route on your PBX. If you wish to redirect incoming Anveo Direct calls using DID-specific inbound routes, then you’ve got a bit more work to do. In addition to creating the inbound route using the 11-digit Anveo Direct DID, enter the following commands after logging into your server as root using SSH/Putty:

cd /etc/asterisk
echo "[from-anveo]" >> extensions_custom.conf
echo "exten => _.,1,Ringing" >> extensions_custom.conf
echo "exten => _.,n,Goto(from-trunk,\\${SIP_HEADER(X-anveo-e164)},1)" >> extensions_custom.conf
asterisk -rx "dialplan reload"

Configuring BulkVS for Incredible PBX 2027-R

Unlike traditional telephony, you have nothing to lose by configuring multiple trunks with Incredible PBX. If you don’t make calls using one or more of the trunks, you pay nothing. Another more recent provider with excellent rates is BulkVS. We’ve covered the BulkVS setup in a separate tutorial if you’d like to give them a try.

Configuring a Softphone for Incredible PBX 2027-R

We’re in the home stretch now. You can connect virtually any kind of telephone to your new PBX. Plain Old Phones require an analog telephone adapter (ATA) which can be a separate board in your computer from a company such as Digium. Or it can be a standalone SIP device. SIP phones can be connected directly so long as they have an IP address. These could be hardware devices or software devices such as the YateClient softphone. We’ll start with a free one today so you can begin making calls. You can find dozens of recommendations for hardware-based SIP phones both on Nerd Vittles and the VoIP-Info.org Forum when you’re ready to get serious about VoIP telephony.

We recommend YateClient for Windows which is free. Download it from here. Run YateClient once you’ve installed it and enter the credentials for the 701 extension on Incredible PBX. You can find them by running /root/show-passwords. You’ll need the IP address of your server plus your extension 701 password. In the YateClient, fill in the blanks using the IP address of your Server, 701 for your Username, and whatever Password was assigned to the extension when you installed Incredible PBX. Click OK to save your entries.

Once you are registered to extension 701, close the Account window. Then click on YATE’s Telephony Tab and place some test calls to the numerous apps that are preconfigured on Incredible PBX. Dial a few of these to get started:

DEMO - Apps Demo
123 - Reminders
947 - Weather by ZIP Code
951 - Yahoo News Headlines
TODAY - Today in History
LENNY - The Telemarketer's Worst Nightmare

If you are a Mac user, another great no-frills softphone is Telephone. Just download and install it from the Mac App Store. For Android users, check out the terrific new VitalPBX Communicator. Works flawlessly with Incredible PBX.

Introducing WebMin for Incredible PBX 2027-R

WebMin is also installed and configured as part of the base install. The root password for access is the same as your Linux root password. We strongly recommend that you not use WebMin to make configuration changes to your server. You may inadvertently damage the operation of your PBX beyond repair. WebMin is an excellent tool to LOOK at how your server is configured. When used for that purpose, we highly recommend WebMin as a way to become familiar with your Linux configuration. To access WebMin, open a browser to http://server-ip-address:9001.

Incredible PBX Administration

We’ve eased the pain of administering your new PBX with a collection of scripts which you will find in the /root folder after logging in as root with SSH or Putty. Here’s a quick summary of what each of the scripts does.

add-fqdn is used to whitelist a fully-qualified domain name in the firewall. Because Incredible PBX 2020 blocks all traffic from IP addresses that are not whitelisted, this is what you use to authorize an external user for your PBX. The advantage of an FQDN is that you can use a dynamic DNS service to automatically update the IP address associated with an FQDN so that you never lose connectivity.

add-ip is used to whitelist a public IP address in the firewall. See the add-fqdn explanation as to why this matters.

del-acct is used to remove an IP address or FQDN from the firewall’s whitelist.

admin-pw-change is used to set the admin password for access to the FreePBX/Incredible PBX web GUI using a browser pointed to the local IP address of your server.

apache-pw-change is used to set the admin password for access to Apache/Incredible PBX apps including AsteriDex and Reminders. This provides a password layer of protection for access to these applications.

reset-conference-pins is a script that automatically and randomly resets the user and admin pins for access to the preconfigured conferencing application. Dial C-O-N-F from any registered SIP phone to connect to the conference.

reset-extension-passwords is a script that automatically and randomly resets ALL of the SIP passwords for extensions 701-705. Be careful using this one, or you may disable existing registered phones and cause Fail2Ban to blacklist the IP addresses of those users. HINT: You can place a call to the Ring Group associated with all five extensions by dialing 777.

reset-reminders-pin is a script that automatically and randomly resets the pin required to access the Telephone Reminders application by dialing 123. It’s important to protect this application because a nefarious user could set up a reminder to call a number anywhere in the world assuming your SIP provider’s account was configured to allow such calls.

show-feature-codes is a cheat sheet for all of the feature codes which can be dialed from any registered SIP phone. It documents how powerful a platform Incredible PBX 2020 actually is. A similar listing is available in the GUI at Admin -> Feature Codes.

show-passwords is a script that displays most of the passwords associated with Incredible PBX 2020. This includes SIP extension passwords, voicemail pins, conference pins, telephone reminders pin, and your Anveo Direct outbound calling pin (if configured). Note that voicemail pins are configured by the user of a SIP extension the first time the user accesses the voicemail system by dialing *97.

update-IncrediblePBX is the Automatic Update Utility which checks for server updates from incrediblepbx.com every time you log into your server as root using SSH or Putty. Do NOT disable it as it is used to load important fixes and security updates when necessary. We recommend logging into your server at least once a week.

pbxstatus (shown above) displays status of all major components of Incredible PBX.

Forwarding Calls to Your Cellphone. Keep in mind that inbound calls to your DIDs automatically ring all five SIP extensions, 701-705. The easiest way to also ring your cellphone is to set one of these five extensions to forward incoming calls to your cellphone. After logging into your PBX as root, issue the following command to forward calls from extension 705 to your cellphone: asterisk -rx "database put CF 705 6781234567"

To remove call forwarding: asterisk -rx "database del CF 705"

Implementing Call By Name with 411

Once you have an Outbound Trunk and Route configured, deploying Call by Name by dialing 411 is simple. The way it works is to pick up any phone connected to your PBX and dial 411. When prompted for the name of the person or company to call, say the name as you entered it in the AsteriDex directory, e.g. Delta Air Lines. The name will then be looked up to decipher the number of the person or company to call. Then the call will be placed using your default outbound route. To deploy Call By Name, simply follow the setup instructions in this Nerd Vittles tutorial.

Keeping FreePBX Modules Current

We strongly recommend that you periodically update all of your FreePBX modules to eliminate bugs and to reduce security vulnerabilities. From the Linux CLI, log into your server as root and issue the following commands:

rm -f /tmp/*
fwconsole ma upgradeall
fwconsole reload
/root/sig-fix
/root/sig-fix

Where To Go From Here

Complete documentation on the ClearlyIP Devices Module is available here.

Complete documentation on the FreePBX GPL Modules is available here.

Complete documentation on the Incredible PBX additions is available here.

An introduction to configuring extensions, trunks, and routes is available here.

Originally published: Sunday, January 1, 2023



Need help with Asterisk? Visit the VoIP-info Forum.


 

Special Thanks to Our Generous Sponsors


FULL DISCLOSURE: ClearlyIP, Skyetel, Vitelity, DigitalOcean, Vultr, VoIP.ms, 3CX, Sangoma, TelecomsXchange and VitalPBX have provided financial support to Nerd Vittles and our open source projects through advertising, referral revenue, and/or merchandise. As an Amazon Associate and Best Buy Affiliate, we also earn from qualifying purchases. We’ve chosen these providers not the other way around. Our decisions are based upon their corporate reputation and the quality of their offerings and pricing. Our recommendations regarding technology are reached without regard to financial compensation except in situations in which comparable products at comparable pricing are available from multiple sources. In this limited case, we support our sponsors because our sponsors support us.

BOGO Bonaza: Enjoy state-of-the-art VoIP service with a $10 credit and half-price SIP service on up to $500 of Skyetel trunking with free number porting when you fund your Skyetel account. No limits on number of simultaneous calls. Quadruple data center redundancy. $25 monthly minimum spend required. Tutorial and sign up details are here.

The lynchpin of Incredible PBX 2020 and beyond is ClearlyIP components which bring management of FreePBX modules and SIP phone integration to a level never before available with any other Asterisk distribution. And now you can configure and reconfigure your new Incredible PBX phones from the convenience of the Incredible PBX GUI.

VitalPBX is perhaps the fastest-growing PBX offering based upon Asterisk with an installed presence in more than 100 countries worldwide. VitalPBX has generously provided a customized White Label version of Incredible PBX tailored for use with all Incredible PBX and VitalPBX custom applications. Follow this link for a free test drive!
 

Special Thanks to Vitelity. Vitelity is now Voyant Communications and has halted new registrations for the time being. Our special thanks to Vitelity for their unwavering financial support over many years and to the many Nerd Vittles readers who continue to enjoy the benefits of their service offerings. We will keep everyone posted on further developments.
 




 

Tired of Waiting on Hold? Here’s a Simple Asterisk Fix



We’ve all placed calls to support lines that keep you waiting on hold for what seems like an eternity. While some companies now offer a call back service that holds your place in the queue, many still do not. One of our users recently asked whether there was a simple way with Asterisk® to preserve your place in line without tying up your phone waiting for the other party to finally pick up the call. Here’s what we came up with.

The idea here is to use Unattended Transfer to transfer your end of the call to an extension that plays a message to dial zero to be reconnected with the calling party once your turn in the call queue finally arrives. To send your call to Pseudo-Hold, dial ##4653# (4653 spells HOLD). On Incredible PBX platforms, this will initiate an unattended transfer of your call and free up your phone.

Now we only need a little Asterisk dialplan code plus a recorded message telling the other party to press 0 to be immediately reconnected with us when they come on the phone. When the other party presses 0, the dialplan will transfer the call back to the extension that transferred the call to what we are referring to as Pseudo-Hold.

To begin, navigate to the custom folder in either /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom or /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/en/custom depending upon your version of Asterisk. Now download and install both the recording and the dialplan snippet:

wget http://incrediblepbx.com/presszero.tar.gz
tar zxvf presszero.tar.gz
rm -f presszero.tar.gz
sed -i '\:// BEGIN Zero:,\:// END Zero:d' /etc/asterisk/extensions_custom.conf
sed -i '/\[from-internal-custom\]/r dialplan.txt' /etc/asterisk/extensions_custom.conf
rm -f dialplan.txt
asterisk -rx "dialplan reload"

For those that are curious, the dialplan.txt snippet looks like this:

;# // BEGIN Zero Reconnect
exten => 4653,1,Answer
exten => 4653,2,NoOp(Dialed Peer Number: ${DIALEDPEERNUMBER})
exten => 4653,3,Background(custom/PressZeroToReconnect)
exten => 4653,4,WaitExten(2)
exten => 0,1,Background(connecting)
exten => 0,2,Dial(SIP/${DIALEDPEERNUMBER})
exten => t,1,Goto(4653,3)
exten => i,1,Goto(4653,3)
exten => h,1,Hangup
;# // END Zero Reconnect

To walk you through how it works, here we go. When you press ##4653#, the call is transferred to the 4653 extension shown above. In line 1, it answers the call. In line 2, it deciphers the extension from which the call was transferred. In line 3, we play the Press Zero to Reconnect message. In step 4, we wait for the other party to press 0. If they don’t within 2 seconds, we loop back up to line 3 and play the message over and over again. If the other party presses zero, we drop down to 0,1 which plays a message saying "Connecting." Then 0,2 sends the call back to the extension that originally transferred the call to 4653.

Originally published: Monday, December 12, 2022



Need help with Asterisk? Visit the VoIP-info Forum.


 

Special Thanks to Our Generous Sponsors


FULL DISCLOSURE: ClearlyIP, Skyetel, Vitelity, DigitalOcean, Vultr, VoIP.ms, 3CX, Sangoma, TelecomsXchange and VitalPBX have provided financial support to Nerd Vittles and our open source projects through advertising, referral revenue, and/or merchandise. As an Amazon Associate and Best Buy Affiliate, we also earn from qualifying purchases. We’ve chosen these providers not the other way around. Our decisions are based upon their corporate reputation and the quality of their offerings and pricing. Our recommendations regarding technology are reached without regard to financial compensation except in situations in which comparable products at comparable pricing are available from multiple sources. In this limited case, we support our sponsors because our sponsors support us.

BOGO Bonaza: Enjoy state-of-the-art VoIP service with a $10 credit and half-price SIP service on up to $500 of Skyetel trunking with free number porting when you fund your Skyetel account. No limits on number of simultaneous calls. Quadruple data center redundancy. $25 monthly minimum spend required. Tutorial and sign up details are here.

The lynchpin of Incredible PBX 2020 and beyond is ClearlyIP components which bring management of FreePBX modules and SIP phone integration to a level never before available with any other Asterisk distribution. And now you can configure and reconfigure your new Incredible PBX phones from the convenience of the Incredible PBX GUI.

VitalPBX is perhaps the fastest-growing PBX offering based upon Asterisk with an installed presence in more than 100 countries worldwide. VitalPBX has generously provided a customized White Label version of Incredible PBX tailored for use with all Incredible PBX and VitalPBX custom applications. Follow this link for a free test drive!
 

Special Thanks to Vitelity. Vitelity is now Voyant Communications and has halted new registrations for the time being. Our special thanks to Vitelity for their unwavering financial support over many years and to the many Nerd Vittles readers who continue to enjoy the benefits of their service offerings. We will keep everyone posted on further developments.
 




 

Sangoma Beefs Up FreePBX Security… For a Price



We’ve lost count of the number of FreePBX® security breaches that were directly attributable to vulnerabilities in the FreePBX web interface. Suffice it to say, it was the reason that PBX in a Flash and Incredible PBX instituted the Travelin’ Man 3 firewall a decade ago hiding the FreePBX GUI from everyone except those on a whitelist controlled by the PBX administrator.

More than a decade later, Sangoma® finally introduces Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) with two major gotchas. First, you have to pay for it. And second, it’s only available using Sangoma’s proprietary FreePBX platform rather than the open source release. There are so many things wrong with this greedy approach that we really don’t know where to begin.

For openers, offering a commercial MFA solution for a supposedly open source product is fundamentally wrong. Think of it this way. You only offer a safe version of your free product if users pay for it. Next, it demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of why two-factor authentication (2FA) and MFA have become ubiquitous. These tools provide an extra layer of security where users have no control over the underlying code of the application. For example, you don’t own PayPal or your bank’s platform so 2FA and MFA provide an extra layer of security for customers attempting to log into their accounts, to prove they are who they say they are using a previously registered cellphone or email account.

Contrast this scenario to those deploying FreePBX who have complete control of the underlying operating system and the FreePBX code itself. MFA doesn’t keep a disgruntled employee from gaining access to a server using an administrator password. MFA also provides zero protection against the myriad of security holes for which FreePBX has become infamous. In short, 2FA and MFA have a single task: allowing users to prove who they say they are by confirming their identity through an external source they control.

We believe Incredible PBX has always offered a better security solution for those that control their own PBX platforms. First, the Travelin’ Man 3 firewall lets you define exactly who can see your FreePBX GUI on the public Internet. If a user isn’t in the TM3 whitelist, they not only can’t login to the FreePBX GUI, they can’t even see it. Second, for the truly paranoid, you can add a third layer of security to the TM3 firewall and FreePBX authentication. Apache offers an additional login threshold for those seeking web access to any application over which the administrator has control. With Incredible PBX, it’s as simple as adding an additional freepbx.conf file in /etc/pbx/httpdconf and restarting Apache:

#Password protect /var/www/html/admin
<directory /var/www/html/admin>
AuthType Basic
AuthName "Restricted Area"
AuthUserFile /etc/pbx/wwwpasswd
Require valid-user
</directory>

An administrator then has control over server access with three layers of security: (1) TM3 firewall access using the add-ip and add-fqdn scripts in /root, (2) Apache access using the apache-pw-change script, and (3) FreePBX GUI access using the admin-pw-change script.

We believe this three-tier, administrator-managed security model offers better and safer protection not only for every user of the FreePBX platform but also for the platform itself. Most importantly, it is and always has been FREE! Start by choosing an Incredible PBX platform that best meets your requirements by visiting the Incredible PBX Wiki.

Originally published: Monday, December 5, 2022



Need help with Asterisk? Visit the VoIP-info Forum.


 

Special Thanks to Our Generous Sponsors


FULL DISCLOSURE: ClearlyIP, Skyetel, Vitelity, DigitalOcean, Vultr, VoIP.ms, 3CX, Sangoma, TelecomsXchange and VitalPBX have provided financial support to Nerd Vittles and our open source projects through advertising, referral revenue, and/or merchandise. As an Amazon Associate and Best Buy Affiliate, we also earn from qualifying purchases. We’ve chosen these providers not the other way around. Our decisions are based upon their corporate reputation and the quality of their offerings and pricing. Our recommendations regarding technology are reached without regard to financial compensation except in situations in which comparable products at comparable pricing are available from multiple sources. In this limited case, we support our sponsors because our sponsors support us.

BOGO Bonaza: Enjoy state-of-the-art VoIP service with a $10 credit and half-price SIP service on up to $500 of Skyetel trunking with free number porting when you fund your Skyetel account. No limits on number of simultaneous calls. Quadruple data center redundancy. $25 monthly minimum spend required. Tutorial and sign up details are here.

The lynchpin of Incredible PBX 2020 and beyond is ClearlyIP components which bring management of FreePBX modules and SIP phone integration to a level never before available with any other Asterisk distribution. And now you can configure and reconfigure your new Incredible PBX phones from the convenience of the Incredible PBX GUI.

VitalPBX is perhaps the fastest-growing PBX offering based upon Asterisk with an installed presence in more than 100 countries worldwide. VitalPBX has generously provided a customized White Label version of Incredible PBX tailored for use with all Incredible PBX and VitalPBX custom applications. Follow this link for a free test drive!
 

Special Thanks to Vitelity. Vitelity is now Voyant Communications and has halted new registrations for the time being. Our special thanks to Vitelity for their unwavering financial support over many years and to the many Nerd Vittles readers who continue to enjoy the benefits of their service offerings. We will keep everyone posted on further developments.
 




 

SpeechGen.io: A Near Perfect TTS Offering for Asterisk



Over the years, we’ve covered numerous commercial and free text-to-speech (TTS) offerings for Asterisk® including gTTS, PicoTTS, Amazon’s Polly TTS, IBM TTS, Google TTS, FLITE, and Festival. But SpeechGen’s commercial offering sets it apart both in terms of quality and cost. At a $9.99 price point for 100,000 characters with an easy-to-deploy AGI interface, SpeechGen is almost a perfect fit for Asterisk TTS applications. If you decide to deploy SpeechGen after trying out our demo, we hope you’ll consider using our referral link which helps offset the cost of providing today’s Weather by ZIP Code demo for everyone:

For those who have deployed Incredible PBX, we have a one-minute install script which will put all the pieces in place to use SpeechGen with our News Headlines and Weather by ZIP Code applications. Simply issue the commands below after logging into your server as root. Next, edit speechgen.php and insert your SpeechGen API token and your email address. Then dial 951 or 947 from any extension connected to your PBX to retrieve today’s news headlines or weather forecast for any U.S. zip code.

cd /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin
wget http://incrediblepbx.com/speechgen.tar.gz
tar zxvf speechgen.tar.gz
rm -f speechgen.tar.gz
./install-speechgen-dialplan.sh
nano -w speechgen.php

Send us your own TTS applications for Asterisk. We’d love to publish them.

Originally published: Monday, October 31, 2022



Need help with Asterisk? Visit the VoIP-info Forum.


 

Special Thanks to Our Generous Sponsors


FULL DISCLOSURE: ClearlyIP, Skyetel, Vitelity, DigitalOcean, Vultr, VoIP.ms, 3CX, Sangoma, TelecomsXchange and VitalPBX have provided financial support to Nerd Vittles and our open source projects through advertising, referral revenue, and/or merchandise. As an Amazon Associate and Best Buy Affiliate, we also earn from qualifying purchases. We’ve chosen these providers not the other way around. Our decisions are based upon their corporate reputation and the quality of their offerings and pricing. Our recommendations regarding technology are reached without regard to financial compensation except in situations in which comparable products at comparable pricing are available from multiple sources. In this limited case, we support our sponsors because our sponsors support us.

BOGO Bonaza: Enjoy state-of-the-art VoIP service with a $10 credit and half-price SIP service on up to $500 of Skyetel trunking with free number porting when you fund your Skyetel account. No limits on number of simultaneous calls. Quadruple data center redundancy. $25 monthly minimum spend required. Tutorial and sign up details are here.

The lynchpin of Incredible PBX 2020 and beyond is ClearlyIP components which bring management of FreePBX modules and SIP phone integration to a level never before available with any other Asterisk distribution. And now you can configure and reconfigure your new Incredible PBX phones from the convenience of the Incredible PBX GUI.

VitalPBX is perhaps the fastest-growing PBX offering based upon Asterisk with an installed presence in more than 100 countries worldwide. VitalPBX has generously provided a customized White Label version of Incredible PBX tailored for use with all Incredible PBX and VitalPBX custom applications. Follow this link for a free test drive!
 

Special Thanks to Vitelity. Vitelity is now Voyant Communications and has halted new registrations for the time being. Our special thanks to Vitelity for their unwavering financial support over many years and to the many Nerd Vittles readers who continue to enjoy the benefits of their service offerings. We will keep everyone posted on further developments.
 




 

VirtualBox Sandbox: Meet Incredible PBX for AlmaLinux 9



Don’t ask me why, but sometimes you just get the urge to try something new even though you expect to encounter a few land mines. Boy, did we. After Red Hat dropped support for the CentOS clone we all knew and loved, Rocky and AlmaLinux sprung to the rescue. While our Rocky 8 release has been well received, we never explored AlmaLinux until they announced the release of AlmaLinux 9, a clone of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 introduced in May, 2022.

One reason to explore new operating systems is to judge how well other components such as Asterisk® and FreePBX® are keeping up with the times. Suffice it to say, the future does not look encouraging. While Asterisk 20 has just been released, FreePBX 16 already is looking long in the tooth. For openers, it uses a node.js release that is 9 versions old. And then there’s PHP. FreePBX 15 required PHP 5.6 while FreePBX 16 relies upon PHP 7.4. The current shipping version of PHP is 8.1.10. Why does this matter? It matters because RHEL 9 and AlmaLinux 9 use SSL3 which wreaks all sorts of havoc using FreePBX 16. For example, downloading and upgrading FreePBX modules now is almost totally broken both in the GUI and using the fwconsole command-line tool. The only workaround is to issue the fwconsole command multiple times until one finally works thanks to a different bug in RHEL 9. Once that bug is addressed, FreePBX module downloads and upgrades will be a thing of the past. Thanks to one enterprising individual, we have managed to download and install most of the FreePBX modules with this script, but it was an hour-long process. Did we mention that Incredible PBX for AlmaLinux 9 is not suitable for production use? Don’t even think about doing it.

So why release Incredible PBX for AlmaLinux 9 at all? The short answer is that everyone deserves an opportunity to see where FreePBX is headed so that you can plan accordingly. Our suggestion is to stick with Incredible PBX 2021 with Debian 10 or Incredible PBX 2022 with Ubuntu 20.04 and enjoy a worry-free VoIP platform for the next 5 years. After that, either some of these issues will get addressed, or Sangoma will be history insofar as open source development is concerned.

If you’ve followed Nerd Vittles over the years, you already know that VirtualBox from Oracle® is one of our favorite platforms. Once VirtualBox is installed on any desktop computer except a new ARM-based Mac, adding Incredible PBX is a snap. Download the latest Incredible PBX for AlmaLinux 9 image from SourceForge, double-click on the downloaded image, and boom. In less than a minute, your PBX is ready to use with the very latest AlmaLinux 9 platform and Asterisk® 20 build plus all of the FreePBX® 16 GPL modules. There are no hidden fees or crippleware to hinder your use of Incredible PBX for as long as you like. If you set up an account with our Platinum provider, Skyetel, you can start making calls in minutes. Of course, the Incredible PBX feature set is included as well which brings you nearly three dozen applications for Asterisk® that will revolutionize your communications platform. Speech-to-text, voice recognition, and a Siri-like telephony interface are as close as your SIP phone. Test things out by dialing these numbers from any SIP phone on your PBX:

  • 123 – Schedule Reminders
  • 947 – Today’s Weather
  • 951 – News Headines
  • 53669 – Lenny for Spammers
  • 86329 – Today in History

Installing Oracle VM VirtualBox

Oracle’s virtual machine platform inherited from Sun is amazing. It’s not only free, but it’s pure GPL2 code. VirtualBox gives you a virtual machine platform that runs on top of non-ARM desktop operating systems. In terms of limitations, we haven’t found any. We even tested this on an Atom-based Windows 7 machine with 2GB of RAM, and it worked without a hiccup. So step #1 today is to download one or more of the VirtualBox 6 installers from VirtualBox.org or VirtualBox 7 installers from Oracle.com. Our recommendation is to put all of the 100MB installers on a 4GB thumb drive.1 Then you’ll have everything in one place whenever and wherever you happen to need it. Once you’ve downloaded the software, simply install it onto your favorite desktop machine. Accept all of the default settings, and you’ll be good to go. For more details, here’s a link to the Oracle VM VirtualBox User Manual.

NOTE: The Incredible PBX VM requires a VirtualBox 6 or 7 platform. Adjust screen size in View -> Virtual Screen.

Installing the Incredible PBX Image

To begin, download the Incredible PBX image (3.5 GB) onto your desktop.

Next, double-click on the Incredible PBX .ova image on your desktop. Be sure to check the box to initialize the MAC address of the image if you’re using an older version of VirtualBox. Then click Import. Once the import is finished, you’ll see a new Incredible PBX for AlmaLinux 9 virtual machine in the VM List of the VirtualBox Manager Window. Let’s make a couple of one-time adjustments to the Incredible PBX configuration to account for possible differences in sound and network cards on different host machines.

(1) Click once on the Incredible PBX virtual machine in the VM List. Then (2) click the Settings button. In System tab, verify Hardware Clock in UTC Time is checked. In the Audio tab, check the Enable Audio option and choose your sound card. In the Network tab for Adapter 1, check the Enable Network Adapter option. From the Attached to pull-down menu, choose Bridged Adapter. Then select your network card from the Name list. Then click OK. That’s all the configuration that is necessary for Incredible PBX.

Running Incredible PBX in VirtualBox

Once you’ve imported and configured the Incredible PBX Virtual Machine, you’re ready to go. Highlight the Incredible PBX virtual machine in the VM List on the VirtualBox Manager Window and click the Start button. The standard Linux boot procedure will begin and, within a few seconds, you’ll get the familiar Linux login prompt. During the bootstrap procedure, you’ll see a couple of dialogue boxes pop up that explain the keystrokes to move back and forth between your host operating system desktop and your virtual machine. Remember, you still have full access to your desktop computer. Incredible PBX is merely running as a task in a VM window. Always gracefully halt Incredible PBX just as you would on any computer.


Here’s what you need to know. To work in the Incredible PBX virtual machine, just left-click your mouse while it is positioned inside the VM window. To return to your host operating system desktop, press the right Option key on Windows machines or the left Command key on any Intel-based Mac. On Linux desktops, press the right Ctrl key. For other operating systems, read the dialogue boxes for instructions on moving around. To access the Linux CLI, login as root with the default password: password. Change your root password when you are prompted to do so. Then update your admin password for web access: ./admin-pw-change. Also update your admin password for web applications: ./apache-pw-change. You’ll need these admin passwords to access the web GUI to manage your PBX as well as to use the AsteriDex and Reminders web apps. The above password updates are automatically requested when you first activate the virtual machine. You can update all of your other passwords using the scripts provided in /root.

Setting the Date and Time with VirtualBox

On some platforms, VirtualBox has a nasty habit of mangling the date and time of your virtual machine. Verify that you have enabled the Hardware Clock in UTC Time option for your virtual machine as documented above. If pbxstatus still shows an incorrect time, manually set the date and time and then update the hardware clock. Here’s how assuming 08130709 is the month (August), day (13), and correct time (7:09 a.m.) of your server:

date 08130709
clock -w

Configuring Skyetel for Incredible PBX

If you’d like to try out the Skyetel service at no charge, here’s the drill. Sign up for Skyetel service to take advantage of the Nerd Vittles specials. First, complete the Prequalification Form here. You then will be provided a link to the Skyetel site to complete your registration. Once you have registered on the Skyetel site and your account has been activated, open a support ticket and request the $10 credit for your account by referencing the Nerd Vittles special offer. Once you are satisfied with the service, fund your account as desired, and Skyetel will match your deposit of up to $250 simply by opening another ticket. That gets you up to $500 of half-price calling. Credit is limited to one per person, company, and address. Effective 10/1/2023, $25/month minimum spend required.

Skyetel does not use SIP registrations to make connections to your PBX. Instead, Skyetel utilizes Endpoint Groups to identify which servers can communicate with the Skyetel service. An Endpoint Group consists of a Name, an IP address, a UDP or TCP port for the connection, and a numerical Priority for the group. For incoming calls destined to your PBX, DIDs are associated with an Endpoint Group to route the calls to your PBX. For outgoing calls from your PBX, a matching Endpoint Group is required to authorize outbound calls through the Skyetel network. Thus, the first step in configuring the Skyetel side for use with your PBX is to set up an Endpoint Group. Here’s a typical setup for Incredible PBX:

  • Name: MyPBX
  • Priority: 1
  • IP Address: PBX-Public-IP-Address
  • Port: 5061
  • Protocol: UDP
  • Description: my.incrediblepbx.com

To receive incoming PSTN calls, you’ll need at least one DID. On the Skyetel site, you acquire DIDs under the Phone Numbers tab. You have the option of Porting in Existing Numbers (free for the first 60 days after you sign up for service) or purchasing new ones under the Buy Phone Numbers menu option.

Once you have acquired one or more DIDs, navigate to the Local Numbers or Toll Free Numbers tab and specify the desired SIP Format and Endpoint Group for each DID. Add SMS/MMS and E911 support, if desired. Call Forwarding and Failover are also supported. That completes the VoIP setup on the Skyetel side. System Status is always available here.

If VirtualBox is sitting behind a router or firewall on a private LAN, you’ll need to forward ports UDP 5060, 5061, and 10000-20000 in your router to the private LAN address of your Incredible PBX server. Also edit your extensions in the GUI and set NAT=YES in the Advanced tab of every extension. In Settings -> Asterisk SIP Settings, click the Detect Network Settings button and then Submit your changes and reload the Asterisk dialplan when prompted.


Finally, login to the FreePBX web GUI as admin using the password you assigned when you set up the virtual machine. Navigate to Connectivity -> Trunks and edit the Skyetel trunk. Change the Disable Trunk setting from Yes to No. Then click Submit and reload your dialplan when prompted. That’s it.

Configuring VoIP.ms for Incredible PBX

To sign up for VoIP.ms service, may we suggest you use our signup link so that Nerd Vittles gets a referral credit for your signup. Once your account is set up, you’ll need to set up a SIP SubAccount and, for Authentication Type, choose Static IP Authentication and enter your Incredible PBX 2020 server’s public IP address. For Transport, choose UDP. For Device Type, choose Asterisk, IP PBX, Gateway or VoIP Switch. Order a DID in their web panel, and then point the DID to the SubAccount you just created. Be sure to specify atlanta1.voip.ms as the POP from which to receive incoming calls. For more details about VoIP.ms, see this Nerd Vittles tutorial.

Configuring SendMail with Incredible PBX

In order to receive voicemails by email delivery, outbound mail functionality from your server obviously is required. If you’ve deployed your server in your home, your Internet Service Provider probably blocks downstream mail servers such as Incredible PBX from sending mail. This is done to reduce SPAM. In this case, you will need to configure SendMail using either your ISP or Gmail as an SMTP Relay Host. We have built an install script to set up a SmartHost using Gmail. You’ll find it in the /root folder. Simply run it and insert your Gmail username and App Password.

Configuring a Softphone for Incredible PBX

We’re in the home stretch now. You can connect virtually any kind of telephone to your new PBX. Plain Old Phones require an analog telephone adapter (ATA) which can be a separate board in your computer from a company such as Digium (not recommended). Or it can be a standalone SIP device such as the Incredible PBX SIP phone. SIP phones can be connected directly so long as they have an IP address. These could be hardware devices or software devices such as the YateClient softphone. We’ll start with a free one today so you can begin making calls. You can find dozens of recommendations for hardware-based SIP phones both on Nerd Vittles and in the Incredible PBX Wiki when you’re ready to get serious about VoIP telephony.

We recommend YateClient for Windows which is free. Download it from here. Run YateClient once you’ve installed it and enter the credentials for the 701 extension on Incredible PBX. You can find them by navigating to Applicaations -> Extensions -> 701 in the FreePBX GUI.

Configuring Incredible PBX for VirtualBox

In order to take advantage of all the Incredible PBX applications, you’ll need to obtain IBM text-to-speech (TTS) and speech-to-text (STT) credentials as well as a (free) Application ID for Wolfram Alpha.

This Nerd Vittles tutorial will walk you through getting your IBM account set up and obtaining both your TTS and STT credentials. Be sure to write down BOTH sets of credentials which you’ll need in a minute. For home and SOHO use, IBM access and services are mostly FREE even though you must provide a credit card when signing up. The IBM signup process explains their pricing plans.

To use Wolfram Alpha, sign up for a free Wolfram Alpha API account. Just provide your email address and set up a password. It takes less than a minute. Log into your account and click on Get An App ID. Make up a name for your application and write down (and keep secret) your APP-ID code. That’s all there is to getting set up with Wolfram Alpha. If you want to explore costs for commercial use, there are links to let you get more information.

In addition to your Wolfram Alpha APPID, there are two sets of IBM credentials to plug into the Asterisk AGI scripts. Keep in mind that there are different usernames and passwords for the IBM Watson TTS and STT services. The TTS credentials will look like the following: $IBM_username and $IBM_password. The STT credentials look like this: $API_USERNAME and $API_PASSWORD. Don’t mix them up. 🙂

All of the scripts requiring credentials are located in /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin so switch to that directory after logging into your server as root. Edit each of the following files and insert your TTS credentials in the variables already provided: nv-today2.php, ibmtts.php, and ibmtts2.php. Edit each of the following files and insert your STT credentials in the variables already provided: getquery.sh, getnumber.sh, and getnumber2.sh. Finally, edit 4747 and insert your Wolfram Alpha APPID.

Using AsteriDex with Incredible PBX

AsteriDex is a web-based dialer and address book application for Asterisk and Incredible PBX. It lets you store and manage phone numbers of all your friends and business associates in an easy-to-use SQLite3 database. You simply call up the application with your favorite web browser: http://pbx-ip-address/asteridex4/. When you click on a contact that you wish to call, AsteriDex first calls you at extension 701, and then AsteriDex connects you to your contact through another outbound call made using your default outbound trunk that supports numbers in the 1NXXNXXXXXX format.

Keeping FreePBX 16 Modules Current

For the reasons previously stated, we strongly discourage updating any of your FreePBX modules. Switch to a more stable platform as documented above when you’re ready to put Incredible PBX into production use.

Originally published: Monday, October 24, 2022



Need help with Asterisk? Visit the VoIP-info Forum.


 

Special Thanks to Our Generous Sponsors


FULL DISCLOSURE: ClearlyIP, Skyetel, Vitelity, DigitalOcean, Vultr, VoIP.ms, 3CX, Sangoma, TelecomsXchange and VitalPBX have provided financial support to Nerd Vittles and our open source projects through advertising, referral revenue, and/or merchandise. As an Amazon Associate and Best Buy Affiliate, we also earn from qualifying purchases. We’ve chosen these providers not the other way around. Our decisions are based upon their corporate reputation and the quality of their offerings and pricing. Our recommendations regarding technology are reached without regard to financial compensation except in situations in which comparable products at comparable pricing are available from multiple sources. In this limited case, we support our sponsors because our sponsors support us.

BOGO Bonaza: Enjoy state-of-the-art VoIP service with a $10 credit and half-price SIP service on up to $500 of Skyetel trunking with free number porting when you fund your Skyetel account. No limits on number of simultaneous calls. Quadruple data center redundancy. $25 monthly minimum spend required. Tutorial and sign up details are here.

The lynchpin of Incredible PBX 2020 and beyond is ClearlyIP components which bring management of FreePBX modules and SIP phone integration to a level never before available with any other Asterisk distribution. And now you can configure and reconfigure your new Incredible PBX phones from the convenience of the Incredible PBX GUI.

VitalPBX is perhaps the fastest-growing PBX offering based upon Asterisk with an installed presence in more than 100 countries worldwide. VitalPBX has generously provided a customized White Label version of Incredible PBX tailored for use with all Incredible PBX and VitalPBX custom applications. Follow this link for a free test drive!
 

Special Thanks to Vitelity. Vitelity is now Voyant Communications and has halted new registrations for the time being. Our special thanks to Vitelity for their unwavering financial support over many years and to the many Nerd Vittles readers who continue to enjoy the benefits of their service offerings. We will keep everyone posted on further developments.
 




 

  1. Many of our purchase links refer users to Amazon when we find their prices are competitive for the recommended products. Nerd Vittles receives a small referral fee from Amazon to help cover the costs of our blog. We never recommend particular products solely to generate Amazon commissions. However, when pricing is comparable or availability is favorable, we support Amazon because Amazon supports us. []

The All-Purpose Device for Home or College-Bound Students



We won’t attempt to educate you on the feature set of Alexa devices other than to note that, in the words of Bob Dylan, "The Times They Are A-Changin’." What was once a device to provide a weather forecast, turn on your lights, lock your front door, and start your car can now function as a full-featured HD TV with an Echo Show 15 and one of your favorite streaming providers including Netflix, Sling, Hulu, and YouTube TV. And, if you didn’t know, Amazon Prime Day is upon us. While we had no insider information, we now can report the Echo Show 15 is discounted from its regular $249 price tag to $169.99. Of course, we would be remiss in not mentioning that Echo devices also can make free phone calls by simply saying, "Alexa, call 800-555-1212." Full Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate, Nerd Vittles earns commissions from qualifying purchases to keep the Nerd Vittles lights burning brightly.

We know you’re wondering whether the streaming TV is really up to the task. Having watched sports and news with YouTube TV on our Echo Show 15, my answer is a resounding YES. Our device sits atop the refrigerator in the kitchen and serves up recipes and timers while also delivering the latest TV shows and sporting events. After all, who can live without "Bachelor in Paradise" while cooking? And the design of the Echo Show 15 gives you the option of positioning it on an optional stand or affixing it to a wall with included mounting hardware.

Loading Hulu or Netflix is simple. Just tell Alexa to open the desired application and login with your credentials. Running YouTube TV on Alexa devices takes a bit of tweaking. Begin with the command: "Alexa, open YouTube." Once YouTube loads, click on the Options icon at the upper left corner of the display. YOUR BOOKMARKS will appear including YouTube.com. Tap the pencil icon and edit the YouTube web address so it looks like this: https://tv.youtube.com. Save your change. Then tap the YouTube.com bookmark to load YouTube TV. Once you log in with your credentials, you will have total access to your YouTube TV channels and your DVR saved recordings. Once you’ve reconfigured the YouTube bookmark, future access to YouTube TV is a three-step process: (1) Alexa, open YouTube (2) Tap Options icon at the upper left corner of the display (3) Tap YouTube.com bookmark.

Finally, Amazon has just announced that Fire TV will be added to the Echo Show 15 user interface later this year. This will allow you to stream TV shows, live news feeds, movies, and sports content. CNET reports that "according to Amazon, the upgrade will provide an additional selection of video titles from Paramount Plus, Showtime, Disney Plus and other platforms. New and existing Echo Show 15 owners will be able to take advantage of the Fire TV update, which will be available as an opt-in feature."

Originally published: Monday, October 10, 2022



Need help with Asterisk? Visit the VoIP-info Forum.


 

Special Thanks to Our Generous Sponsors


FULL DISCLOSURE: ClearlyIP, Skyetel, Vitelity, DigitalOcean, Vultr, VoIP.ms, 3CX, Sangoma, TelecomsXchange and VitalPBX have provided financial support to Nerd Vittles and our open source projects through advertising, referral revenue, and/or merchandise. As an Amazon Associate and Best Buy Affiliate, we also earn from qualifying purchases. We’ve chosen these providers not the other way around. Our decisions are based upon their corporate reputation and the quality of their offerings and pricing. Our recommendations regarding technology are reached without regard to financial compensation except in situations in which comparable products at comparable pricing are available from multiple sources. In this limited case, we support our sponsors because our sponsors support us.

BOGO Bonaza: Enjoy state-of-the-art VoIP service with a $10 credit and half-price SIP service on up to $500 of Skyetel trunking with free number porting when you fund your Skyetel account. No limits on number of simultaneous calls. Quadruple data center redundancy. $25 monthly minimum spend required. Tutorial and sign up details are here.

The lynchpin of Incredible PBX 2020 and beyond is ClearlyIP components which bring management of FreePBX modules and SIP phone integration to a level never before available with any other Asterisk distribution. And now you can configure and reconfigure your new Incredible PBX phones from the convenience of the Incredible PBX GUI.

VitalPBX is perhaps the fastest-growing PBX offering based upon Asterisk with an installed presence in more than 100 countries worldwide. VitalPBX has generously provided a customized White Label version of Incredible PBX tailored for use with all Incredible PBX and VitalPBX custom applications. Follow this link for a free test drive!
 

Special Thanks to Vitelity. Vitelity is now Voyant Communications and has halted new registrations for the time being. Our special thanks to Vitelity for their unwavering financial support over many years and to the many Nerd Vittles readers who continue to enjoy the benefits of their service offerings. We will keep everyone posted on further developments.
 




 

VirtualBox Wonder: It’s Incredible PBX for Debian 11




If you’re new to the VoIP world and want to kick the tires to see what you’re missing, then today’s one minute setup is for you. You’ll get a $10 credit to try out some penny-a-minute calls and to purchase a $1 a month phone number in your choice of area codes. If you decide VoIP is not for you, you don’t have to buy anything ever. And you can use almost any desktop computer you already own to bring up the VirtualBox® edition of Incredible PBX® with Debian 11. Apple’s new ARM-based Macs unfortunately do not support VirtualBox.

If you’ve followed Nerd Vittles over the years, you already know that VirtualBox from Oracle® is one of our favorite platforms. Once VirtualBox is installed on your desktop computer, adding Incredible PBX is a snap. Download the latest Incredible PBX image for Debian 11 from SourceForge, double-click on the downloaded image and boom. In less than a minute, your PBX is ready to use with the very latest components of Asterisk® 18 and FreePBX® 15. There are no hidden fees or crippleware to hinder your use of Incredible PBX for as long as you like. Just set up an account with our Platinum provider, Skyetel, and you can start making calls in minutes. Of course, the Incredible PBX feature set is included as well which brings you nearly three dozen applications for Asterisk that will revolutionize your communications platform. Speech-to-text, voice recognition, and a Siri-like telephony interface are as close as your SIP phone.

Installing Oracle VM VirtualBox

Oracle’s virtual machine platform inherited from Sun is amazing. It’s not only free, but it’s pure GPL2 code. VirtualBox gives you a virtual machine platform that runs on top of many desktop operating systems including Linux, Windows, and Intel-based Macs. In terms of limitations, we haven’t found any. We even tested this on an Atom-based Windows 7 machine with 2GB of RAM, and it worked without a hiccup. So step #1 today is to download one or more of the VirtualBox installers from VirtualBox.org or Oracle.com. Our recommendation is to put all of these 100MB installers on a USB thumb drive.1 Then you’ll have everything in one place whenever and wherever you happen to need it. Once you’ve downloaded the software, simply install it onto your favorite desktop machine. Accept all of the default settings, and you’ll be good to go. For more details, here’s a link to the Oracle VM VirtualBox User Manual.

NOTE: A VirtualBox 6.x platform is required. Adjust screen size in View -> Virtual Screen.

Installing the Incredible PBX for Debian 11 Image

To begin, download the Incredible PBX for Debian 11 image (3.7 GB) onto your desktop.

Next, double-click on the Incredible PBX .ova image on your desktop. Be sure to check the box to initialize the MAC address of the image if you’re using an older version of VirtualBox. Then click Import. Once the import is finished, you’ll see a new Incredible PBX for Debian 11 virtual machine in the VM List of the VirtualBox Manager Window. Let’s make a couple of one-time adjustments to the Incredible PBX configuration to account for possible differences in sound and network cards on different host machines.

(1) Click once on the Incredible PBX virtual machine in the VM List. Then (2) click the Settings button. In System tab, check Hardware Clock in UTC Time. In the Audio tab, check the Enable Audio option and choose your sound card. In the Network tab for Adapter 1, check the Enable Network Adapter option. From the Attached to pull-down menu, choose Bridged Adapter. Then select your network card from the Name list. Then click OK. That’s all the configuration that is necessary for Incredible PBX.

Running Incredible PBX for Debian 11 in VirtualBox

Once you’ve imported and configured the Incredible PBX Virtual Machine, you’re ready to go. Highlight the Incredible PBX virtual machine in the VM List on the VirtualBox Manager Window and click the Start button. The standard Linux boot procedure will begin and, within a few seconds, you’ll get the familiar Linux login prompt. During the bootstrap procedure, you’ll see a couple of dialogue boxes pop up that explain the keystrokes to move back and forth between your host operating system desktop and your virtual machine. Remember, you still have full access to your desktop computer. Incredible PBX is merely running as a task in a VM window. Always gracefully halt Incredible PBX just as you would on any computer.

Here’s what you need to know. To work in the Incredible PBX virtual machine, just left-click your mouse while it is positioned inside the VM window. To return to your host operating system desktop, press the right Option key on Windows machines or the left Command key on any Mac. On Linux desktops, press the right Ctrl key. For other operating systems, read the dialogue boxes for instructions on moving around. To access the Linux CLI, login as root with the default password: password. Change your root password when you are prompted to do so. Then update your admin password for web access: ./admin-pw-change. Also update your admin password for web applications: ./apache-pw-change. You’ll need these admin passwords to access the web GUI to manage your PBX as well as to use the AsteriDex and Reminders web apps. The above password updates are automatically requested when you first activate the virtual machine. You can update all of your other passwords using the scripts provided in /root.

Setting the Date and Time with VirtualBox

On some platforms, VirtualBox has a nasty habit of mangling the date and time of your virtual machine. Verify that you have enabled the Hardware Clock in UTC Time option for your virtual machine as documented above. If pbxstatus still shows an incorrect time, manually set the date and time and then update the hardware clock. Here’s how assuming 08130709 is the month (August), day (13), and correct time (7:09 a.m.) of your server:

date 08130709
clock -w

Configuring Skyetel for Incredible PBX

If you’d like to try out the Skyetel service at no charge, here’s the drill. Sign up for Skyetel service to take advantage of the Nerd Vittles specials. First, complete the Prequalification Form here. You then will be provided a link to the Skyetel site to complete your registration. Once you have registered on the Skyetel site and your account has been activated, open a support ticket and request the $10 credit for your account by referencing the Nerd Vittles special offer. Once you are satisfied with the service, fund your account as desired, and Skyetel will match your deposit of up to $250 simply by opening another ticket. That gets you up to $500 of half-price calling. Credit is limited to one per person, company, and address. Effective 10/1/2023, $25/month minimum spend required.

Skyetel by default does not use SIP registrations to make connections to your PBX. Instead, Skyetel utilizes Endpoint Groups to identify which servers can communicate with the Skyetel service. An Endpoint Group consists of a Name, an IP address, a UDP or TCP port for the connection, and a numerical Priority for the group. For incoming calls destined to your PBX, DIDs are associated with an Endpoint Group to route the calls to your PBX. For outgoing calls from your PBX, a matching Endpoint Group is required to authorize outbound calls through the Skyetel network. Thus, the first step in configuring the Skyetel side for use with your PBX is to set up an Endpoint Group. Here’s a typical setup for Incredible PBX:

  • Name: MyPBX
  • Priority: 1
  • IP Address: PBX-Public-IP-Address
  • Port: 5060
  • Protocol: UDP
  • Description: my.incrediblepbx.com

To receive incoming PSTN calls, you’ll need at least one DID. On the Skyetel site, you acquire DIDs under the Phone Numbers tab. You have the option of Porting in Existing Numbers (free for the first 60 days after you sign up for service) or purchasing new ones under the Buy Phone Numbers menu option.

Once you have acquired one or more DIDs, navigate to the Local Numbers or Toll Free Numbers tab and specify the desired SIP Format and Endpoint Group for each DID. Add SMS/MMS and E911 support, if desired. Call Forwarding and Failover are also supported. That completes the VoIP setup on the Skyetel side. System Status is always available here.

If VirtualBox is sitting behind a router or firewall on a private LAN, you’ll need to forward ports UDP 5060 and 10000-20000 in your router to the private LAN address of your Incredible PBX server. Also edit your extensions in the GUI and set NAT=YES in the Advanced tab of every extension. In Settings -> Asterisk SIP Settings, click the Detect Network Settings button and then Submit your changes and reload the Asterisk dialplan when prompted.

Configuring VoIP.ms for Incredible PBX

To sign up for VoIP.ms service, may we suggest you use our signup link so that Nerd Vittles gets a referral credit for your signup. Once your account is set up, you’ll need to set up a SIP SubAccount and, for Authentication Type, choose Static IP Authentication and enter your Incredible PBX server’s public IP address. For Transport, choose UDP. For Device Type, choose Asterisk, IP PBX, Gateway or VoIP Switch. Order a DID in their web panel, and then point the DID to the SubAccount you just created. Be sure to specify atlanta1.voip.ms as the POP from which to receive incoming calls.

Configuring Anveo Direct for Incredible PBX

To sign up for Anveo Direct service, sign up on their web site and then login. After adding funds to your account, purchase a DID under Inbound Service -> Order DID. Next, choose Configure Destination SIP Trunk. Give the Trunk a name. For the Primary SIP URI, enter $[E164]$@server-IP-address. For Call Options, select your new DID from the list. You also must whitelist your public IP address under Outbound Service -> Configure. Create a new Call Termination Trunk and name it to match your server. For Dialing Prefix, choose six alphanumeric characters beginning with a zero. In Authorized IP Addresses, enter the public IP address of your server. Set an appropriate rate cap. We like $0.01 per minute to be safe. Set a concurrent calls limit. We like 2. For the Call Routing Method, choose Least Cost unless you’re feeling extravagant. For Routes/Carriers, choose Standard Routes. Write down your Dialing Prefix and then click the Save button.

Before you can make outbound calls through Anveo Direct from your PBX, you first must configure the Dialing Prefix that you wrote down in the previous step. Log into the GUI as admin using a web browser and edit the Anveo-Out trunk in Connectivity -> Trunks. Click on the custom-Settings tab and replace anveo-pin with your actual Dialing Prefix. Click Submit and Apply Config to complete the setup.

By default, incoming Anveo Direct calls will be processed by the Default inbound route on your PBX. If you wish to redirect incoming Anveo Direct calls using DID-specific inbound routes, then you’ve got a bit more work to do. In addition to creating the inbound route using the 11-digit Anveo Direct DID, enter the following commands after logging into your server as root using SSH/Putty:

cd /etc/asterisk
echo "[from-anveo]" >> extensions_custom.conf
echo "exten => _.,1,Ringing" >> extensions_custom.conf
echo "exten => _.,n,Goto(from-trunk,\\${SIP_HEADER(X-anveo-e164)},1)" >> extensions_custom.conf
asterisk -rx "dialplan reload"

Configuring a Softphone for Incredible PBX

We’re in the home stretch now. You can connect virtually any kind of telephone to your new PBX. Plain Old Phones require an analog telephone adapter (ATA) which can be a separate board in your computer from a company such as Digium. Or it can be a standalone SIP device. SIP phones can be connected directly so long as they have an IP address. These could be hardware devices or software devices such as the YateClient softphone. We’ll start with a free one today so you can begin making calls. You can find dozens of recommendations for hardware-based SIP phones both on Nerd Vittles and the PIAF Forum when you’re ready to get serious about VoIP telephony.

We recommend YateClient for Windows which is free. Download it from here. Run YateClient once you’ve installed it and enter the credentials for the 701 extension on Incredible PBX. You can find them by running /root/show-passwords. You’ll need the IP address of your server plus your extension 701 password. In the YateClient, fill in the blanks using the IP address of your Server, 701 for your Username, and whatever Password was assigned to the extension when you installed Incredible PBX. Click OK to save your entries.

Configuring Incredible PBX for VirtualBox

In order to take advantage of all the Incredible PBX applications, you’ll need to obtain IBM text-to-speech (TTS) and speech-to-text (STT) credentials as well as a (free) Application ID for Wolfram Alpha.

This Nerd Vittles tutorial will walk you through getting your IBM account set up and obtaining both your TTS and STT credentials. Be sure to write down BOTH sets of credentials which you’ll need in a minute. For home and SOHO use, IBM access and services are mostly FREE even though you must provide a credit card when signing up. The IBM signup process explains their pricing plans.

To use Wolfram Alpha, sign up for a free Wolfram Alpha API account. Just provide your email address and set up a password. It takes less than a minute. Log into your account and click on Get An App ID. Make up a name for your application and write down (and keep secret) your APP-ID code. That’s all there is to getting set up with Wolfram Alpha. If you want to explore costs for commercial use, there are links to let you get more information.

In addition to your Wolfram Alpha APPID, there are two sets of IBM credentials to plug into the Asterisk AGI scripts. Keep in mind that there are different usernames and passwords for the IBM Watson TTS and STT services. The TTS credentials will look like the following: $IBM_username and $IBM_password. The STT credentials look like this: $API_USERNAME and $API_PASSWORD. Don’t mix them up. 🙂

All of the scripts requiring credentials are located in /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin so switch to that directory after logging into your server as root. Edit each of the following files and insert your TTS credentials in the variables already provided: nv-today2.php, ibmtts.php, and ibmtts2.php. Edit each of the following files and insert your STT credentials in the variables already provided: getquery.sh, getnumber.sh, and getnumber2.sh. Finally, edit 4747 and insert your Wolfram Alpha APPID.

Using AsteriDex with Incredible PBX

AsteriDex is a web-based dialer and address book application for Asterisk and Incredible PBX. It lets you store and manage phone numbers of all your friends and business associates in an easy-to-use SQLite3 database. You simply call up the application with your favorite web browser: http://pbx-ip-address/asteridex4/. When you click on a contact that you wish to call, AsteriDex first calls you at extension 701, and then AsteriDex connects you to your contact through another outbound call made using your default outbound trunk that supports numbers in the 1NXXNXXXXXX format.

Keeping FreePBX 15 Modules Current

We strongly recommend that you periodically update all of your FreePBX modules to eliminate bugs and to reduce security vulnerabilities. From the Linux CLI, log into your server as root and issue the following commands:

rm -f /tmp/*
fwconsole ma upgradeall
fwconsole reload
/root/sig-fix
systemctl restart apache2
/root/sig-fix

Taking Incredible PBX for a Test Drive

You can take Incredible PBX on a test drive by dialing D-E-M-O (3366) from any phone connected to your PBX.

With Allison’s Demo IVR, you can choose from the following options:

  • 0. Chat with Operator — connects to extension 701
  • 1. AsteriDex Voice Dialer – say "Delta Airlines" or "American Airlines" to connect
  • 2. Conferencing – log in using 1234 as the conference PIN
  • 3. Wolfram Alpha Almanac – say "What planes are flying overhead"
  • 4. Lenny – The Telemarketer’s Worst Nightmare
  • 5. Today’s News Headlines — courtesy of Yahoo! News
  • 6. Weather by ZIP Code – enter any 5-digit ZIP code for today’s weather
  • 7. Today in History — courtesy of OnThisDay.com
  • 8. Chat with Nerd Uno — courtesy of SIP URI connection to 3CX iPhone Client
  • 9. DISA Voice Dialer — say any 10-digit number to be connected
  • *. Current Date and Time — courtesy of Incredible PBX

Originally published: Monday, September 19, 2022



Need help with Asterisk? Visit the VoIP-info Forum.


 

Special Thanks to Our Generous Sponsors


FULL DISCLOSURE: ClearlyIP, Skyetel, Vitelity, DigitalOcean, Vultr, VoIP.ms, 3CX, Sangoma, TelecomsXchange and VitalPBX have provided financial support to Nerd Vittles and our open source projects through advertising, referral revenue, and/or merchandise. As an Amazon Associate and Best Buy Affiliate, we also earn from qualifying purchases. We’ve chosen these providers not the other way around. Our decisions are based upon their corporate reputation and the quality of their offerings and pricing. Our recommendations regarding technology are reached without regard to financial compensation except in situations in which comparable products at comparable pricing are available from multiple sources. In this limited case, we support our sponsors because our sponsors support us.

BOGO Bonaza: Enjoy state-of-the-art VoIP service with a $10 credit and half-price SIP service on up to $500 of Skyetel trunking with free number porting when you fund your Skyetel account. No limits on number of simultaneous calls. Quadruple data center redundancy. $25 monthly minimum spend required. Tutorial and sign up details are here.

The lynchpin of Incredible PBX 2020 and beyond is ClearlyIP components which bring management of FreePBX modules and SIP phone integration to a level never before available with any other Asterisk distribution. And now you can configure and reconfigure your new Incredible PBX phones from the convenience of the Incredible PBX GUI.

VitalPBX is perhaps the fastest-growing PBX offering based upon Asterisk with an installed presence in more than 100 countries worldwide. VitalPBX has generously provided a customized White Label version of Incredible PBX tailored for use with all Incredible PBX and VitalPBX custom applications. Follow this link for a free test drive!
 

Special Thanks to Vitelity. Vitelity is now Voyant Communications and has halted new registrations for the time being. Our special thanks to Vitelity for their unwavering financial support over many years and to the many Nerd Vittles readers who continue to enjoy the benefits of their service offerings. We will keep everyone posted on further developments.
 




 

  1. Many of our purchase links refer users to Amazon when we find their prices are competitive for the recommended products. Nerd Vittles receives a small referral fee from Amazon to help cover the costs of our blog. We never recommend particular products solely to generate Amazon commissions. However, when pricing is comparable or availability is favorable, we support Amazon because Amazon supports us. []

Incredible PBX for Debian 11: The Flexible Asterisk Solution


We enjoy some infrequent entertainment reading the latest Reddit posts about Incredible PBX®. The comments range from "stealing FreePBX®" to "they move too fast" to "there are too many add-ons, only some of which I use." Most of the naysayers, of course, post anonymously. From the general tenor, it’s pretty simple to conclude that most of these folks have little clue about how open source development works much less any understanding of GPL licensing. Others are probably affiliated with competitors. So, despite the temptation, we’ve heeded the advice of George Bernard Shaw to "never wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and besides, the pig likes it."

Let’s spend a minute addressing the "move too fast" argument. Since COVID reared its ugly head, less than a handful of Asterisk® and FreePBX developers still reside in North America. Most are now citizens of India. While that’s not a bad thing, it does tell you that there is virtually no remaining institutional knowledge with regard to how Asterisk or FreePBX was constructed… or where the bodies are buried. That’s the primary reason that we created our own firewall solution many years ago because you never knew when a recent Sangoma® hire or contractor would change something that might cascade into a major security breach.
Sh*t Happens! So, yes, when it comes to security, we move quickly.

Then there’s the timetable for Asterisk and FreePBX development. New versions of Asterisk are released annually while FreePBX module updates occur almost every week. That is a slippery slope to navigate even for their own staff much less an outside entity with no access to development data. Sangoma has blurred the development process even further by restricting development ticket information to just their own employees. So, yes, when new FreePBX modules are released that blow something up because the Sangoma people didn’t catch the bug internally, we move quickly.

And finally there’s the RedHat elephant in the room which turned years of secure CentOS development on its ear. So, yes, we’ve scrambled to find operating system alternatives that are more trustworthy. The irony of all this is that, in my former life, heading up an IT development staff, telecom was the least of my worries because you could measure telecom stability in terms of decades, not years or months.

And that brings us to 2022 and where things stand. Our objective always has been to deliver a stable telecom solution that could run almost unattended for many, many years. In fact, our home system still runs on Vultr for $2.50 a month with CentOS 6, Asterisk 13, and FreePBX 13. Weekly backups push the monthly cost to $3.00, and it never hiccups. So, no, YOU DON’T HAVE TO UPGRADE YOUR PBX IF IT’S SECURE AND IT MEETS YOUR CURRENT NEEDS!

While we continue to support multiple operating systems including Rocky 8, Ubuntu 20.04, and the latest Raspberry Pi OS, our preferred and recommended platform is Debian. It’s rock-solid reliable and runs well on Cloud platforms. If you’re still running your PBX in house, you’ve got a Death Wish. Find a reputable cloud provider that offers backups and migrate to the Cloud. You’ll find numerous options on the Incredible PBX Wiki.

Last week we introduced the new Incredible PBX beta 2 release with Debian 11. While it’s not for everyone, it, too, is rock-solid now. It also offers three flexible install options. You can choose the base install with Debian 11, Asterisk 18 LTS, and FreePBX 15. Or you can upgrade to Debian 11, Asterisk 18 LTS, and FreePBX 16. Or you can upgrade to Debian 11, Asterisk 19, and FreePBX 16. Just keep in mind that Asterisk 19 is a one-year release that’s about to expire so our recommendation is to stick with Asterisk 18 LTS running with either FreePBX 15 or 16.

So, yes, we offer sensible choices on stable platforms with no commercial hooks. To simplify getting started, we add extensions, trunks, outbound and inbound routes, ring groups, conferencing, text-to-speech and speech-to-text with sample AGI scripts for News, Weather, Voice Dialing, and more. Then we test our solutions on over 40 servers that we maintain on premise and in the cloud and offer literally hundreds of Nerd Vittles tutorials to kickstart your VoIP adventure. If that’s your cup of tea, we hope you’ll come join the party. Otherwise, there are plenty of proprietary alternatives from which to choose.

They say seeing is believing so we’ve uploaded a VirtualBox image with Debian 11, Asterisk 18 LTS, and FreePBX 16 to SourceForge. Once you download it, the VirtualBox install takes about 3 minutes, and you’ll be up and running. Numerous tutorials on VirtualBox already are available on Nerd Vittles, and we’ll add one for Debian 11 next week. In the meantime, enjoy!

Originally published: Monday, April 5, 2022



Need help with Asterisk? Visit the VoIP-info Forum.


 

Special Thanks to Our Generous Sponsors


FULL DISCLOSURE: ClearlyIP, Skyetel, Vitelity, DigitalOcean, Vultr, VoIP.ms, 3CX, Sangoma, TelecomsXchange and VitalPBX have provided financial support to Nerd Vittles and our open source projects through advertising, referral revenue, and/or merchandise. As an Amazon Associate and Best Buy Affiliate, we also earn from qualifying purchases. We’ve chosen these providers not the other way around. Our decisions are based upon their corporate reputation and the quality of their offerings and pricing. Our recommendations regarding technology are reached without regard to financial compensation except in situations in which comparable products at comparable pricing are available from multiple sources. In this limited case, we support our sponsors because our sponsors support us.

BOGO Bonaza: Enjoy state-of-the-art VoIP service with a $10 credit and half-price SIP service on up to $500 of Skyetel trunking with free number porting when you fund your Skyetel account. No limits on number of simultaneous calls. Quadruple data center redundancy. $25 monthly minimum spend required. Tutorial and sign up details are here.

The lynchpin of Incredible PBX 2020 and beyond is ClearlyIP components which bring management of FreePBX modules and SIP phone integration to a level never before available with any other Asterisk distribution. And now you can configure and reconfigure your new Incredible PBX phones from the convenience of the Incredible PBX GUI.

VitalPBX is perhaps the fastest-growing PBX offering based upon Asterisk with an installed presence in more than 100 countries worldwide. VitalPBX has generously provided a customized White Label version of Incredible PBX tailored for use with all Incredible PBX and VitalPBX custom applications. Follow this link for a free test drive!
 

Special Thanks to Vitelity. Vitelity is now Voyant Communications and has halted new registrations for the time being. Our special thanks to Vitelity for their unwavering financial support over many years and to the many Nerd Vittles readers who continue to enjoy the benefits of their service offerings. We will keep everyone posted on further developments.